Google Extends Safe Browsing By Default To Chrome For Android

In order to protect millions of users who access the Internet through mobiles, Google has now brought its Safe Browsing feature to Chrome for Android.

We hunt badness on the Internet so that you don’t discover it the hard way, and our protection should never be an undue burden on your networking costs or your device’s battery. As more of the world relies on the mobile web, we want to make sure you’re as safe as can be, as efficiently as possible.

The feature was already available to those who have opted for Google’s data compression feature on Android but now it is available as a stand-alone feature in Chrome 46 which will be activated by default. The feature can be accessed and verified by going through the Privacy settings in Chrome for Android.

iPhone users, though, have to enable the data compression to have safe browsing ON in Chrome. The feature has also been integrated with Google Playstore version 8.1 to keep a check on unwanted app installs.

Earlier this year, Safe Browsing was upgraded by Google to improve detection of Unwanted Software (UwS) and to display more visible warnings for potential malware attacks and UsW.

Safe Browsing has been a consistent part of Chrome for Desktop for the past two years, but it was not available for mobile phone devices. Google points out that the constraints of mobile data such as speed, connectivity and battery life are crucial factors which needed to be taken into account before enabling Safe Browsing on mobile.

With Safe Browsing now enabled for mobile devices, they have also optimised the software to prevent compromise to battery life and wastage of data.

We made the software on the device extra stingy with memory and processor use, and careful about minimizing network traffic. All of these details matter to us; we must not waste our users’ data plans or a single moment of their battery life.